The Madison Square Garden Incident (Part 1)

19.05.1996 @ Madison Square Garden

One of the more talked-about actions involving The Kliq took place on May 19, 1996 at Madison Square Garden. At the time, Hall and Nash were about to leave the WWF for rival WCW and this was their last contractual obligation for the WWF. At a major WWF live event, Levesque (as the villainous Helmsley) wrestled the fan favorite Scott Hall (as Razor Ramon). Later that night, Michaels, then a fan favorite, wrestled Nash (as the heel Diesel) in a steel cage match. Immediately after the match, Scott Hall entered the ring and hugged Michaels, which is not seen as a problem as both were fan favorites at the time. However, Levesque and Nash both joined the hug, despite working their matches as heels.

Their actions, also dubbed the "Curtain Call", scandalized WWF management, who at the time wanted to maintain the illusion that the antipathy between fan favorites and villains was real and that they were not friends outside the ring.

WWF Chairman, Vince McMahon was reported to be initially okay with the incident, but did not expect them to take it so far. McMahon also did not expect a fan in the audience to sneak a camcorder into the event and capture the entire incident on tape, which was later procured by the WWF and aired on the October 6, 1997 episode of Raw is War by Michaels and Levesque who, in storyline, used the footage to irritate McMahon. Because Michaels was the WWF Champion at the time and was one of the promotion's biggest drawing cards, he could not be punished. Hall and Nash were soon to leave for WCW, so they also escaped punishment. The punishment fell solely on Levesque, who was demoted from being a championship contender to wrestling inexperienced or lesser experienced wrestlers.

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• Scott
• Hall
• Shawn
• Michaels
• Kevin
• Nash
• Triple
• WWE
• WWF
• WCW
• Kayfabe
• Steel
• Cage
• Madison
• Square
• Garden
• Incident

[reymyesterio1]

whats the msg incident

[waschbeckenfrisch]

@reymyesterio1

read the description -.-

[thejaygoon6]

@trinity1129 oo ok i c now..so vince didnt want the fans to kno that they were really friendz??

[trinity1129]

@thejaygoon6 This was Hall and Nash's last match w/ WWF b4 goin to WCW to do their NWO thing. Nash, Hall, HHH, and Michaels were suposed 2 b rivals on TV and the ring. But they were best friends. Their little group was called "The Clique" bhind the scenes. So at the end of this match they all hugged and shook hands fuckin up Vince Mcmahon's future storylines. Their celebration at the end was not planned and Vince was pissd!

[CyberEndJinzo]

Whats really ironic and strange is that HHH was goin to win King of the ring and get a massive push, but cuz he was being punished they actually gave his push to Austin, who won king of the ring instead and ended up as one of the most poplar wrestlers in history. And despite that HHH got his push the next year anyway. :/

[JL90s]

triple h saying goodbye to his roody poo friends at madison square garden

[imlaughing2death]

You can hear some faint E-C-W chants when Nash swings the chair and misses.

[kingrichard3england]

was this a main event?? eg mania? summerslam? in your house? as im now 30 and have been watchin wwf for years would like to download the vid and rewatch this

[saggsman]

@thejaygoon6 its call key fabe, if you don't break character and make fans believe the rivalry was really then you got something right.

[arpegio88]

...Yeah & also Triple H was punished for this incident as well. You ever hear of throwing someone under the bus?...Well Vince threw Helmsley under a TRAIN!! A very long train; making him job on tv from May to about mid November.

[Louis701124]

i was there 1st row

[BadAceNews]

if it weren't for this there would  be no 3:16

[AliceNchainz011]

kayfabe is soo stupid

[tubehows4life]

Turns out management gave permission to them to do that after the guys asked them if they could do it, but then the other wrestlers got all pissed about them breaking kayfabe so Vince had to show he was doing something about it to keep order.